"You're Lying" - Terrible Secondary Wound

109 posts in this topic

Guest

Rachel, congratulate yourself for having the courage to come forward about it, and feel sorry for the very ignorant and dispicable people who have the nerve to accuse you of wrong-doing when you were definitely not at all at fault.

I hope there are some who stand by you, but if not, they weren't your friends to start out with. I changed schools, maybe that would be a possibility for you. Find intelligent others who don't go around believing lies and myths, but who check out the facts, and behave like civilized adults. They might be worthy of being your friend. the question isn't whether or not you deserve to be friends with any of these people; the question is whether they deserve to be friends with you.

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Guest

My greatest fear was if/when I told that no one would believe me. I was lucky because when I finally did tell (2 years after it had happened), I was in a Childrens Psychiatric Hospital and they were 'trained' to believe me. But my parents had a hard time believing me, though they have (luckily) come to realize it was true. However, my stupid sister still doesn't believe me.

My parents don't believe me about the second rape or my pregnancy with Adrian, though they're starting to realize that it just might be true.

The biggest run in with the whole "Your lying" thing is with two of my friends. After the second rape, about a month after it, shortly after I found out, I knew I had to tell someone, I wasn't going to make the same mistake twice. So I told about 5 of my friends (I think just about all the girls in high school (13) know about it now) and asked for their help.

If they hadn't supported me at the time, I would be dead right now. After I lost the second baby, about a week or two after, I took 30 aspirin. I was talking to one of them on the internet while I was writting the note and they guessed it, even though they didn't say anything until the next day. I had been talking to the RAINN crisis hotline in my area recently and had talked to them earlier that day. They had said they would call back before 10, I called them around 4. Then the bast@rd who raped me called. That set me over the edge and before I knew it I was counting out 15 pills. Later, I figured out that they weren't 'working', so I counted out 15 more and took them. The crisis center called back an hour after I'd taken the last 15 pills. That's why I'm alive.

Ne how,

A few months after that, two of my friends started treating me like $hit. They wouldn't tell me why and started playing mind games. I hate that.

Finally, one night on the internet, I was chatting with some friends when one of them signed on. I will say hi even if I hate you, so of course I said hi. She said hi.

Me: Hi

Friend #1: hi

Me:Sup?

Friend #1:nm

Friend #1: Do u smoke weed?

Me:y?

(Her mom was a dispatcher at the police station, of course now my dad's a cop, but I was not sure I wanted to tell her that I had before)

Friend #1: just wondering

Friend #1: Cause I smoke week all of the time

I figure that I could tell her I had before.

Friend #1: So do u smoke weed?

Me: yeah, I do, I have since I was 13. I was actually considered a pot head in *my home town*(sorry I can't give the name in this post, I'm also not gonna mention names)

Friend #2 is added to the coversation

Friend #1: You there *friend number 2*?

Friend #2:hi

Me:hi

A few more things were said, and, unfortionetly, I could see where it was going. My veiws were soon realized.

Friend #1: Jennie, why do you always f#cking lie?

I was trying to remain calm as far as they could tell, even though I was hystarical and crying as I was typing.

Me: What exactly have I lied about?

Friend #1: We know everything

Friend #2: We know everything about you.

Me: Oh, you do

Me: So what all do you know about me?

Friend #1: We know everything, we're the queens of knowing everything

Friend #2: Why are you always telling lies?

Me: What exactly have I lied about?

Friend #1: you know I'm pregnant

Me: Oh

I was choosing to keep an open mind, incase, for some reason, they were reaching out, even though I saw exactly where it was going.

Me: How far along are u?

Friend #1: I don't know, like a month or something

Me: So what are you gonna do?

Friend #1: Keep the freakin kid!

Me: That's cool

Friend #1: you're so freakin gullible!

Me: o

Me: so ur not preg?

Friend #2: No duh

Me: do you think I'm lying about being pregnant?

Friend #2: I don't know, what do you think?

Me: Do you?

Friend #1: What the #### are we supposed to think?

Me: y would I lie about something like that?

Me: y the #### did I take 30 aspirin?

Me: I made the worst choice in the world when I did that and I hurt a lot of people

Friend #1: No kidding

Friend #2: maybe u just wanted attention

Friend #1: Why did u lie about it?

Me: You don't know what your getting into

Friend #2: what do you mean, what are you gonna do go crazy like Carrie 2 the Rage?

Me: no, why the #### would you say something like that? Do you really think I'm that psychotic

Me: what I mean is that is a subject that I don't like to talk about because it upsets me a lot

Me: You try going through it and not say not to open that subject up when you DON'T want to talk about it

Me: I was pregnant and lost my baby and now ur accusing me of lying about it?

Me: *friend #2* I can't believe u didn't believe me when I asked you for help.

Friend #2: then why are you lying all the time?

Me: Why are you doing this?

Friend #2: We're just trying to help you

Me: then help me by believing me when I tell the TRUTH

Me: or don't help me because then I don't want ur help

Me: I came to YOU for help

There was silence for a while

Friend #2: I've got to go

Me: Right

Me: ttyl

Me: good luck with the pregnancy

I signed out before they had a chance to talk back.

The next day one of them called me a liar in not so many word, bringing up the whole pot thing. We were in the locker room. After both of them left, I tried to kill my locker. Actually I just threw my gym clothes and shoes in it as hard as I could and then slammed the door. Another girl asked what was wrong, but then she asked if she wanted to know. I said that she didn't.

These two girls liked to cause problems. Things settled down a bit and one of them finally talked to me on the internet. She said that she wasn't pregnant and I said I know. I asked if we were still friends and she said, Uh....yeah. But they were still being stupid. So finally I asked a mutal friend, who bought my pregnancy test and knew for a fact that I was pregnant, what was up with them.

She got mad (at them). I'm guessing she confronted them about it, because the next day friend #2 wrote lier (misspelled) on my locker poster. It made me SOOOOO mad. I wanted to rip it off, but couldn't, my ulcers decided to give me a run for my money. I went downstairs and called my mom to bring my medicine. I was just shaking. I ran into my school couselor and asked if she had any white out. I showed her what was written and corrected the spelling. I decided to leave it. It was stupid, they were being idiots.

We never really resolved it, but they left me alone about it. But it has always been a fear of mine that no one would believe me. I HATE it. I wish people would just f%ck off!

Sorry that was so long, I've been wanting to get that whole story out for a long time.

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Guest

age 6 : after i was r***d, i went back into class and tried to tell the teacher. i didnt know what happened to me really (i was just 6). i stopped at the bathroom to wash off the blood. anyway, when i got back to class, she told me she saw me coming back from the playground and go into the bathroom for about an hour (how she didnt see what happened, i dont know, or maybe she didnt care). when i told her i was hurt by these 2 guys (again, i didnt know the word), she said i was just lying and had no reason to cry. she made me sit in the corner and think about the mistake i made coming back to the class a few hours late. and that it wasnt right to interrupt everyone else's learning because i wanted to play a little while longer.

age 10 : this foster kid staying with my grandma mo****ed me. when i told my grandmother, she called me a liar. she told me i looked like a boy, so why would a 14-yr-old boy want to touch me. and since i wasnt crying, nothing happened. she sent me to my room and told me to think about what it meant to make false accusations.

a few days later, he r***d me. i gave him this huge gash (i used a sharp stick) and when i ran into the house to get away, he had told my grandmother on me. he buried the knife he had and told my grandma it was mine (and that's how he got the huge cut). i told her it wasnt, but of course, she didnt believe me, and went to see the knife. she punished me and made me apologize to him for hurting him so badly.

then the bastard tries to mo***t my younger sister, and i stop him. my grandma accused me of watching it happen and wanting to join in. she called me a whore and accused me of wanting his attention, and that i'd even lie to get it. i literally punched her and called her everything in the book i could. i couldnt believe what she had done. it made me sick. sorry.

my dad was out in the Med somewhere (he was on sea duty for the navy) and my mom was up in Norfolk trying to get us into housing.

age 16 : i dont wanna say anything about that yet. but i got detention, a gun on me, and almost killed if we didnt move.

age 22 : i was given Special K (drug) in my drink without me knowing. when i tried to tell people, it was horrible. when i told a couple friends (who i thought were, anyway), they said since i was asleep, it wasnt rape since i couldnt fight back, and i just need to stop whining. that i was lying cuz i just wanted to cover up a mistake i made (i dunno about anyone else, but i always cover up mistakes by saying i was r***d). "if you were drugged, how do you know?" (the fact that i woke up in the middle of it). and that girls like me are always throwing the word "rape" around for fun. it goes on and on like that, trust me...

but yah, it really is hard to keep defending yourself when the people dont wanna listen, they just wanna criticize. it's no wonder i havent really told anyone about what's happened to me.

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Guest

I believe you and I am so sorry for everything that has happened to you, for what it's worth. Your foster moher sounds horrible. I'm thankful I didn't have to be in foster care, although my parents weren't terribly compassionate or helpful and they were never "there for me."

I feel so badly for you, you have been through so much. Just remember, it's not what people think or believe, it's what you know in your heart to be true.

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Lora

I have hd a number of people say some of the standard "stupid" things, but only two people outright accused me of lying. The first was my former pastor (!) who thought that I had just gotten myself into a "situation" and that if I had REALLY been raped at knifepoint, I would have reported it. The second was by the (former) "friend" in whose kitchen I was attacked. My t. and I have talked a couple of times about why she accused me of lying (allegedly to get attention), and how (or whether) she could really possibly believe that I lied since SHE was the one who had to clean the blood/urine/semen mess off of her kitchen floor a day later...

I have tried to just write these people off as insensitive jerks (and, in the latter case, probably someone in serious denial about something like that beging able to happen in her own home), but the accusation still cuts deeply.

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Guest

Oh this world is so full of evil people it sickens me. I have told absolutely no one, (except my boyfriend found me afterwards so he knows) but I may have to tell some people before long, I could not bear such accusations from them, it would be dreadful. I am quite sorry everyone that such things were said to you.

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Guest

Oh my...people are so RIDICULOUS....GRRR!!! My family (especially my mother) does't really believe me. I waited nearly 4 years to tell anyone because I was trying to forget about it. I thought I was just being a stupid girl and that I had wanted it deep down, but regretted it later (I had a crush on him, and he was one of my good friends and a friend of the family's. I willingly undressed and even started "hooking up" with him and then it stopped being fun). I got physically ill when one of my best friends told me she was raped at a party, and I started crying uncontrollably for her (and for me) because I knew EXACTLY how she felt. I finally told someone. My family found out because they couldn't believe that I was so depressed and eating disordered among other things. My mother sat me down and said "I may be telling you something you don't want to hear, but you need to hear this from someone who loves you. You were not raped. You just regret what happened because you had sex with ---- when you were 15. He would not do something like that to you. I think you were just upset because he always like [my best friend at the time] more than he ever liked you. You just feel used and you regret what happened, but you weren't raped."

It was so sickening! I felt like throwing up because she was trying to be so loving about it. Like she was setting me straight so I wouldn't go around claiming I was raped. Oh she also had the nerve to tell ALL of her friends and to tell me that they didn't believe me either. Another time, she took me to see some QUACK of a family shrink. SHe found it her business to say to him, "And she CLAIMS she was raped." First of all, I was not comfortable sharing with this QUACK of a shrink, and secondly it is not her place to share MY stuff with someone.She still doesn't believe me and I hve learned to not talk about it with her. I can't waste my energy on people like her who cannot support me for whatever reasons in their own heads. Luckily, I do have friends that believe me. Date/acquaintance rape are very real forms of rape as we all know. It hurts so deeply that my own mother who is supposed to be my everlasting support does not believe me and probably never will. She is probably the only person that I really wish would believe me and hold me and just cry for me and the innocence that was stolen from me. But she probably never will believe me. And I just have to keep surrounding myself by people who do believe me. It's all I can do to stay sane.

I have posted in this topic but I thought I would again. I told my story and NO ONE believed me all i got was those boys would never do something like that it must have been you... But really all any of those people did was make me want to show them they were wrong, to be successful. You just gotta hang in there we can all do it.

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rinoa

8 months after it happened, I finaly plucked up the courage to report the deputy head to the headmistress.

As I began to say what happened, she sat there, arms crossed, glaring at me, her lips pinched like she was sucking a lemon.

I'd only been talking about 2 mins, hadn't gotten very far in when she snorted/sniggered and said:

"well what did he think he was going to do to you?"

I replied that I hadn't known. I didn't get any further with my story.

She said to me:

" I don't believe you are telling me the truth"

She also said

" I don't want you to talk about this to anyone".

THEN, she finally called my mum, to tell her I had made an allegation about a member of staff.

When my mum arrived, the head told us that I would be "removed" from school for "my own safety" (odd, since she 'didn't believe anything had happened', and that under no circumstances was I to speak to any of my school friends.

I will never forget her final words to me as I left the room:

" I think there are things going on inside you head that are not real".

I was only 15 at the time. Her words will haunt me forever. They silenced me for 6 years.

Every time I have to talk about/choose to talk about it, I hear her words ringing in my ears, telling me she didn't believe me and that I mustn't talk about it.

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raw&burnt

Raw & Burnt

Member

155 posts

Membership Type:Survivor

Location:Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

Interests:Performing on stage and before a camera, DVD's/movie buff, Jewellery-Making, Teddybears, lip balm, online diaries, RCMP uniforms, black boots, film and television and vegan/vegetarian cooking. I also love to watch "Law & Order: SVU" on tuesday nights.

It's come to a point where I don't tell anyone anymore. The only forum I trust is this one. When I have told someone, it was from the pain I couldn't deal with anymore, only to have a secondary wounding of being discredited. I lost friends over this, like it were my fault. I was treated like a pariah, like I was spreading some verbal virus. One frienemy took me out to a restaurant to tell me that the mutual frienemy who raped me was going on with his life, that he was happy. Also that I should see a hypnotherapist to help get over "what I believed happened" to me. This was his own intervention to snip me out of the circle so that everyone else could go on with their lives. I was treated like I were the one causing harm, while he gets away with his act and discredits me. I have so much hate and loathing for some of those people. I still can't believe I was shouted at and told that I was "just being vengeful", like I was some evil witch purposely causing trouble and up to no good. Before even telling anyone, I felt no one would beleive me, that I should keep this to myself until one frienemy confessed that he knew what happened between him and I that day. My only way of figuring this out was that I'd wrote the perpetrator a note and slipped it under his door, telling him my feelings about how he made me feel. Obviously the letter was hidden from him for his protection and I was seen as the villain. Several people were "theorizing" about it together, coming up with their own conclusions. I didn't want to hear how they were gossiping about me. They betrayed me and abandoned me when I needed support. With most crimes, you get over something when you get support, but with a sexual violation, you are abandoned and your scars are aggravated. Without support, you're damaged even more. I was expecting to get over this with support from my friends, but I was terribly wrong. I was treated like I raped someone, like I started this whole mess and had controll over it. I could go on and on about this, but it'll never get out of my system.

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marie

I'm not feeling ready to talk about my own experiences right now. But I really feel a strong need to say thank you for starting this thread. And, to everyone here, I do believe you, and I'm very very sorry other people responded in such horribly cruel and abusive ways when you reached out to them for support. They had no right to hurt you, and, as far as I'm concerned, they should no longer have the right to breath.

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Guest TeddyBearAngel

Thanks so much for this thread! This is the hardest thing to deal with for me. I never told my family because I knew they would accuse me of lying. My best friend was raped in third grade by her stepdad and when I tried to tell my parents about it my mom said she must be lying and my stepdad said that rape was something that happened in the movies or that I had seen it on TV and was just fantasizing about it. What fucking planet is HE from??? I was eight years old when my friend got raped and I had been being abused for two years by then so after they reacted that way to my friends story I knew I could never tell them and I didn't. I told my friend and she and I still share our pain and help each other. Its wonderful to have her. I never told anyone else until I met my recent boyfriend. He is the one person in my world who cried with me when I told him my story. I asked him why he was crying and he said "Because I can't understand how anyone could do that to someone. What a monster." It was then that I knew that I was safe with him and I could tell him anything. I am glad that I found at least one person who believes me, and weeps for me, and LOVES me!

And on another thought: WHY would ANYONE lie or make up a story about something as HORRID as sexual abuse? Its hard enough for us to tell our story because it is TRUE!

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sheblynn

i too am appaled that people could think we are making such things up myself i have been accused of lying the only person (besides posting here) i told was my husband he has said more then one time that i was lying then he said if i told anyone else they might believe i was assulated but they wouldnot believe i was stalked and kidnapped so i haven't told anyone cause i don't want to be looked at like a liar

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Louise

This is a wound that is just as hard to heal as the actual abuse itself (in my opinion, not sure how much my opinion counts though...)

I totally agree, Sherri. I think Aphrodite Matsakis makes that point in her book that a secondary wound can feel as bad if not worse in some ways as the original trauma. Who among us wouldn't have found healing easier if we hadn't had to deal with waves of invalidation and disbelief?

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headface

The psych nurse said that you were lying!?!?!!? That is completely unprofessional...she should be..demoted to janitor.. or something.. lol I'm sorry that you had to go through that, especially in what they like to call "a safe envoronment". I also spent some joyous (sarcasm) time in a psych ward and I was lucky to be working with the most compassionate people I've ever met.

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shysarah8

and it really hurts thinking that when i see him again or one day he may ask me to explain or even prove that what happened really happened isnt that terrible im scared , scared shit less i mean what do you say

i could say ' fuck you dont beleive me im not bothered'

but the problem is i am it hurts that people think im lieing what sort of sick person would do that

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Qmonkey

my mother, who is a survivor herself didn't believe me when I told her about the CSA some years ago. Later I thought she believed me. Because she was attending survivor groups and all kinds of stuff. Then, about 2 years ago, I talked to her and realizzed that she still doesn't believe it. She demands to know *physical* details *puke!!!!!!* to prove it.

That was the moment when I decided I can't have a good relationship with her, ever.

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starry

i was never accused of lying literally to my face....but i do know i was ACUSED of it! i was accused of it, because the R stared his best friend in HIS EYES when he lied, so the guy believed that his bestfreind DIDNT LIE TO HIM. this made me UPSET for YEARS!!!!! the "friend" would tell my bestfriend that he knew his bestfriend DIDNT LIE cuz he LOOKED HIM in the eyes...and he claimed his bestfriend NEVER lied to him. i even felt like our Mutual friend believed his lies too.

it made me sick to know that HE was trying to lie to me, and that i caught him in a lie....red handed.

my own mother never accused me of lying, but totally BLAMED me and i felt like our relationship was completely ruined for at least a yr and a half..... i still could never possibly forgive her...and when i visit at home, though it has been years later, i sometimes wonder how i can carry on with life around her as if it never happened. i regret telling anyone in my family, especially my mom.

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Kaiya

I've been told plenty of things about both incidents that happened to me...

My best friend told me that whilst she belived that I didn't give consent I had no right to call what happened to me rape becuase I wasn't dragged off the street....

My other friend told me that yeah something happened but not rape....:-S

I've also been told that I must have said yes but forgotten as I was drunk....I was too drunk to give consent..being in and out of conciousness and I know I didnt say yes....

I had same friend tell me it didnt count as he was only inside me for a few mins and he had told he hadnt came.....so if he hadnt ejeculated it wasnt rape :-S

I was told about the second incident that i just shouldnt have let him sleep in my bed...the fact i was already asleep there when the guy got in it (was at a house party) aparantly dosnt matter...

My ex boyfriends mum told me that these things happen to loads of people and there was no point crying about it...

someone also told me that if it happened to them it wouldnt bother them at all...and my ex told me that most of the girls he knew would have woken up and kicked him in the balls and forgot about it....

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Stephanie

I am really sorry you had to hear such rubbish. Rape is not defined by being dragged of the street it is defined by whether a person consented to sex or not so your friends comment makes no sense at all. I hope being here is helping you to disregard all these comments.

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mad_madam_mimi

Does anyone else feel like those newspaper stories about "False memories" make them feel like they're being accused of lying about their own abuse? Whenever I hear someone talk, on tv or in person (or even on-line) about "witch-hunts" and "families destroyed" and all that, I always feel like they're talking to me. And besides, how do they know it isn't true? Just because someone wasn't found guilty in court doesn't mean their accuser is a liar.

Anyway, I always feel like its personal, like the newspaper is calling me a liar...

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Kate

Michelle - I feel that way too. It makes me cringe when I hear that because not only does it make me feel bad, it just reinforces those myths in the minds of those who believe them, so they go along in their day happy in the knowledge that they're the right ones - abuse is all just one big lie right? (sarcasm)